


lay me down tonight (lay me by your side)

by curlylou



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Angst, Depression, Emotional Trauma, Flashbacks, Harry is sad, Heavy Angst, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Oneshot, but theres not really any comfort, im sad, kinda freeform idk, so just hurt, somewhat inspired by lay me down, the sam smith song
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-19
Updated: 2015-02-19
Packaged: 2018-03-13 20:11:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,790
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3394847
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/curlylou/pseuds/curlylou
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They said that the hurt would go away after a while. They said the numbness would fade, that the hole inside of him would fill, that he would forget.</p><p>They were wrong.</p>
            </blockquote>





	lay me down tonight (lay me by your side)

**Author's Note:**

> So this is the first fic I've ever published! And yeah so feedback is super duper appreciated and constructive criticism is awesome.
> 
> General warning for major character death, depression that isn't really ever called depression but definitely is, mentions of car crashes/hospitals, and basically lots of sadness.

They said that the hurt would go away after a while. They said the numbness would fade, that the hole inside of him would fill, that he would forget.

 

They were wrong.

 

Harry knows they were wrong because its been two years since the funeral and he still can' t get out of bed without thinking of how Louis looks, looked, in the morning. Its been two years and he can't look in the mirror when he brushes his teeth because the space next to him is much too empty. It's been two years and Harry hasn't slept in their bed because it's not the same without Louis tucked against him. It's been two years and Harry hasn't sold their flat because every corner speaks Louis' name.

 

He knows he needs to let go. Move on. Start living again.

 

But a life without Louis is not one that Harry wants to participate in.

 

\--------------------

 

Harry's mobile rings from his coffee table next to where he sleeps on the sofa. There are always a few seconds where Harry feels okay, he feels something like content. Then he remembers why he sleeps on the couch and why he always wears long sleeves to cover his tattoos and he remembers Louis, and it feels like a boulder is sitting on his chest. He craves those few seconds of disoriented calm, and he hates himself for it.

 

The phone continues to ring, buzzing persistently against the wood. He checks the screen and sees that it reads “Mum Calling” before answering with a sleep-rough greeting.

 

“Harry, love, how are you?”

 

“M'fine mum, just woken up is all.”

 

“Harry,” Anne murmurs. “How are you, really? I know you, love, and you don't sound fine.”

 

Harry pauses. “I'm just tired, promise.”

 

“Alright, alright. I just want you to be happy again. It kills me to see you in pain.”

 

“I know mum, I promise I'm doing okay. I'm feeling better.”

 

“I'm so glad, Harry. Listen, I've got to run but I think it would do you some good to get out of the house, go out for a drink with your boys. I'm sure they've been missing you.”

 

The very last thing Harry wants to do is go out to a bar that will somehow remind him of all he's lost, but he wants to make Anne happy.

 

“Yeah, I'll call them up now, thanks. Love you.”

 

“I love you too, Harry. Talk to you soon.”

 

Harry hangs up and tosses his mobile onto the couch.

 

Anne definitely has a point. He hasn't seen any of his friends in months. He had thought it was better this way, so that he could let them move on when he couldn't.

 

He picks his phone up again, and after a moment of deliberation dials Liam's number.

\---------------------------

After agreeing on a time and a meeting place with Liam – Harry can't deal with more than one person at a time - he begins getting ready to go out, something he hasn't done since before the accident. He grabs a clean set of clothes from the hallway closet and showers in the guest room. The spare room is empty, never decorated, and it is safe from the memories that permeate every other area. Leaving the bathroom, he catches a glance of himself in the mirror and almost doesn't recognize himself. His hair is longer than it has ever been, limp and dull. His cheekbones jut out from his face and create dark hollows in his cheeks, and his eyes are surrounded by dark shadows. Now Harry remembers why he took down the other mirrors around the flat; they were constant reminders of what was missing from his life.

Reaching for his coat to leave, he sees their bedroom door on he edge of his vision. There must be some gravitational pull to it, Harry thinks to himself, because he finds himself walking over, slowly. He stands outside the door, waiting for something, and he doesn't know what that something is but he waits. As if in a dream, Harry sees himself reach for the doorknob and push it open and-

 

The door swings open on hinges creaky from disuse. He stares into the sliver of darkness, takes a breath, and pushes through the door.

 

The room still smells like Louis and Harry thinks he is suffocating with it. It's slightly musty and the air is stale, but there is an overwhelming sense of Louis and his presence in this room. It smells like his aftershave, and the ridiculous fruity hair gel Harry had given him as a joke gift.

 

Harry reaches out to grab the dresser, suddenly weak from the memories that are attacking with startling intensity. His heart is constricting is his chest, and he thinks that if there was ever a time that he was going to die it would be now. His vision goes out and suddenly Harry is next to Louis. Its the morning, and Louis isn't awake yet and he is so beautiful like this that Harry can't bear to wake him. It's mid afternoon and they're sitting in the kitchen, looking at pictures of the house they could live in one day, and Louis is looking at Harry with more love in his eyes than should be possible. It's that evening and Harry is waiting at the restaurant for Louis to arrive from work. He has the ring in his pocket and a speech somewhat prepared. Louis is running late and it is 7:24 and he gets the call ( _There's been an accident oh god harry i'm scared theres so much blood please come_ ). He is still going over it in his head when it is midnight and the hospital is full of too much white and and the operating room is full of too much Louis. The ring is still in his pocket and now it is 4 am and the doctor walks out of the operating room with failure etched in every line of his face. Harry's hands are shaking and his vision is blurry and this will be the last time he cries.

 

Harry's knees buckle and the force of his body hitting the ground jolts him from the flashback. Head spinning, he lurches out the door and slams it shut behind him, closing off all the memories that he had stowed away for so long. He stumbles out the front door of the flat, out into the freezing air that would be a shock if he weren't so numb. How could he possibly think that he could move on from Louis, that he could live without him and function normally every day? Maybe before he could but certainly not now, not with memories of Louis ripped to the forefront of his mind and sticking there, swirling and raging and _trapped_.

 

He makes it to the bar where he was supposed to meet Liam without realizing that he had even moved from the sidewalk outside his flat. The warm air and dim lights that envelope him as he steps inside are a welcome change from the wintry sun outside.

 

“Harry?”

 

He looks around and focuses in on Liam, sitting at the bar and watching him with a concerned expression.

 

“Liam”, Harry says, still standing in the entryway. “Good to see you.”

 

“Are you alright, mate? You look as if you've just run a mile, c'mere and sit down.”

 

Harry lets Liam guide him to a stool and watches blankly as the bartender sets a mug in front of him.

 

“Seriously, Harry, what's wrong? I haven't seen you in ages, none of us have, we were getting really worried! And now you're here and, to be quite frank, you look like shit.”

 

Harry almost smiles at that.

 

Liam hesitates, watching Harry carefully.

 

“We all miss him, you know.”

 

He isn't close to smiling anymore.

 

Liam continues.

 

“I know it was hard on you, and I can't imagine what you've been through, but I lost my best friend that day, too. And now it seems as if I lost you as well. He wouldn't want you to be this way. You know he wouldn't.”

 

Harry's eyes grow tight and his fists clench on the table. He feels his heart begin beating quicker and he wills it to slow down, to stop telling him to run, to hide where no one can see him.

 

He exhales slowly, carefully.

 

“You think I don't know what he would want? You think the same exact thought doesn't cross my mind in a hundred different voices every day when I look at what a fucking mess I am? Believe me, Liam, I know that I'm supposed to move on. I also know that I can't. Y'know why?”

 

There is a gentle warning in Liam's voice now.

 

“Harry-”

 

“I haven't moved on from him because I can't. Because it's impossible to move on from someone who's still there. I see him in everything I do and everyone around me has a piece of him on them and I can't go a single day without wishing I was in that car right alongside him because at least I wouldn't have to remember him.”

 

“And the most terrifying part?” Harry's voice is shaking now and the words are spilling out even when he tells them to stop. “The worst part is that I don't want to forget. Because if I go on living without him in every aspect of my life, I'm fucking _terrified_ that I'm going to forget him entirely. That I might someday not remember exactly what he looked like when he was sleeping or how his laugh sounded when it was startled out of him or how he used to look at me as if I were the most precious person in the world and I would never, ever forgive myself for that.”

 

His hands are shaking as much as his words and the empty silence that hangs in the air is invisible but it is the most solid thing Harry has ever felt.

 

Liam reaches out to take his hand.

 

“Harry, I'm sorry if I sounded that way, I just-”

 

“I know, and I'm not angry at you. Really.”

 

Harry sighs heavily, trying to find words that had come so easily just a moment ago.

 

“I'm going to go visit him on his birthday, I think. Yeah. I'll do that.”

 

Liam's eyes widen ever so slightly as his eyebrows furrow.

 

“Are you... Are you sure that's a good idea? I mean, you haven't been since the funeral-”

 

“It's his birthday.” Harry interrupts. “I'm going to be thinking about him all day, and I. I can't just stay at home with that on my mind.”

 

 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The morning of December 24th comes, and it is beautiful. There is a layer of white snow just barely covering the ground, and the sun is shining in a cloudless sky of pale blue, deceptively bright in the freezing air.

 

This was Louis' favorite kind of weather.

 

When Harry wakes, the shining sun seems to mock him, blinding him with its ignorance. Its ignorance of the fact that Louis is not here to see this.

 

Harry's plan for the day is simple, but it may be the hardest thing he has ever done. He hasn't been to the cemetery since the day of the funeral, and there is a reason. But, here he is, wrapping a worn grey scarf around his neck and stepping out into the cold winter air. Nine steps and he's made it to the sidewalk. 43 more and he's turning the corner down a familiar street. The cemetery is only four blocks east of the flat, a small grassy area tucked into the neighborhood, with towering maples scattered throughout. Their branches are bare now, and the shadows on the white ground almost seem like lace. A willow stands at the entrance to the site, it's thin tendrils brushing the ground gently. They glitter with ice as Harry walks through, pushing them aside with gloved hands. His green eyes reflect their light when he looks up, remembering playing under trees like this one as a child. Life was easier when people didn't die, they just went away to a place where it was always warm and sunny. When the people in cemeteries were strangers, gone away long ago, and loved ones didn't wait in the cold unforgiving ground waiting for a visitor.

 

Harry had never understood as a child why adults didn't want him to play in the trees and hills of the cemetery, why his grandmothers eyes had held such a sadness in them whenever they passed over the endless rows of stones. He knows now that these places are the literal fucking embodiment of sadness and the only reason he doesn't hate the very word 'cemetery' is because Louis thought they were beautiful and poetic. But then Louis could find beauty in anything.

 

Numb legs carry Harry down the path he has only walked once before, the actions burned into his muscles even after two years and exactly six days. The world seems to be swirling in grey and melancholy and too-blue skies as Harry walks up to a granite headstone weathered by rain, but still newer than it's surroundings. The inscription reads Tomlinson in bold letters across the top. He wonders if this is what it feels like to drown.

 

The marker is alien and all too familiar, a sense of empty déjà vu. The ground is suddenly weak and Harry finds himself kneeling in the frozen grass, shoulders slumped as he reads the inscription over and over.

 

TOMLINSON

Louis William Tomlinson

December 24, 1991 – December 10, 2014

Always in our hearts.

 

For two years Harry has felt as though his heart wasn't in his chest at all. That Louis had taken it with him when he left, because Louis wasn't in his heart, he _was_ his heart. But right now Harry feels it beating in his chest and god it hurts _so fucking much_.

 

For all that the air around him is thin and cold it feels like molten lava burning past the lump in his throat in shallow gasps, like knives in his lungs, the pain fresh and immediate.

 

When Harry was seven, he had been swimming with Gemma in a neighbors pool and tried to do a turn underwater. He spun around in the deep water and became confused, unable to find the surface. The chlorine had stung his eyes and everything was bright and blurred and his body ached for oxygen. What seemed like hours was only a few seconds before Gemma pulled his trashing body from the water. The moments before his rescue were terrifying, the disorientation making him gasp and inhale water as his limbs grew sluggish with the lack of oxygen.

 

Harry feels the exact same sensation begin to creep over him, flashes of memory swirling and striking his mind. Crowds of mourners dressed in black, white flowers that smelled overwhelmingly of false sentiment. A murder of crows silenced by the grief permeating every surface. Hollow words of reassurance and sympathy, a casket starkly contrasted against pale sky and ground. A prayer heard but not listened to, a broken sob echoing through the trees. Every memory comes as a cold blow. After two years of numbing emptiness Harry can feel everything and it is threatening to crush him.

 

Suddenly Harry is all too much in the present, right here in front of a headstone that shouldn't be there, bearing a name that should be written in the stars and not on a slab of granite. He feels every blocked emotion of the last two years of his existence (not life, because he wasn't really alive was he) flooding his senses and there are tears spilling freely down his face. He is shaking, choking, and this is the first time he has cried since that night of too much white and too much blood and too many empty condolences from doctors that didn't understand how it felt to have your reason to live gone.

 

Hours pass. Harry doesn't move. His body has no more tears to shed, is too weak to do anything but mourn.

 

He lay his head on the ground, curls into a ball, and closes his eyes.

 

\-------------------------

 

Hypothermia. Exposure to extreme temperatures. Thats what the doctors said. His immune system was weak from months of undernourishment and simply couldn't handle being outside for so long, surrounded by the harsh cold that seeped up through the ground and filled the air. The autopsy report was filled with long medical terms detailing exactly why his heart stopped beating. Because it's impossible to die of a broken heart, they said.

 

They were wrong.

 

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! I'm on tumblr at hazzattacked.tumblr.com if you want to check that out.


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